Saturday, July 9, 2011

Gomgoma: First time I watched these Greeks live. Earlier this year I was impressed by their EP (review coming soon, in the mean time you can find it ). I will not lie, I had high expectations. Some cool songs most of them coming from their new album which I believe is going to be a killer one. Unlike the Electric Wizard cover (still floating on Youtube), their “Wolverine Blues” cover is actually a fuc*ing monster (watch the video). Their singer is a charismatic sludge-frontman but generally I was given the impression that the band still needs some rehearsals. Given time I think this band will find its way to the top!Church of Misery: I have to make one thing clear, I like Eyehategod but Church of Misery was the real headliners of the night for me, right from the start. My review might not be objective but I dare you to find a better live band on the underground scene! It seems that Black Sabbath was born again and this time they decided to be a little sludgier! The Japanese 4-piece with Suto on guitars and not some new (western) member as I expected thought that it is a great idea to go killing spree. And they did just that. I think the video that follows doesn’t quite show what happened especially during the second half of their show! Neggy is one crazy mofo and a helluva performer at the same time! At times he was jumping high in the air landing on the stage with his butt (outch!), did crowdsurfing with his microphone while singing, invited people from the crowd to sing together some lines! I have to admit that vocally he wasn’t at his best but I guess this is because of the extended tour that preceded. The rest of the band was delivering some CD quality tunes with Mikami stealing the spotlight with his unusual bass playing style. Line of the night: “Next up: Eyehategod! Get it? Eye (I)-Hate-God…” (Edit: dahhh!)

Eyehategod: Looking at Mike walking slow and bored before the show, I thought that this would be another one of those “let’s do the fuckin job, take the money and get the hell outa here” type of performances. Well, I was way off! I can’t really say that Mike tells the best jokes neither that he does something special as a frontman, but the guy (and the band) makes you feel as if they are playing just for you! About 80% of the crowd was Eyehategod crowd so you can imagine what happened…First time I time I saw a guy hanging from the roof of this club, in what I imagine to be an attempt to do reverse crowdsurfing (?!?!?), and of course large mosh-pits was the rule for every song. The highlight of the night was “Sister Fucker” performed by both Eyehategod and Church of Misery. All hell breaks loose!!! Words cannot describe it you had to be there! Line of the night: “Your are a handsome crowd! Handsome faces all of you! Beautiful mouths…” (Edit: I wonder if this counts as sexual harassment back in the States).

Epilogue: This is what appears to be the last gig for this season and what a way to close a dream-like year! Given the economic situation of Greece I don’t expect that next year will be remotely any good as this one, then again with this kind of promoters there is still hope. So my kudos to the promoters who I think are the same with ones behind the Wino gig. (No, I don’t know the guys…and with that being said what the hell happened to the air condition?)